“Can they, like get fingerprints from her neck? Can they catch the guy that way?”“This guy isn’t an amateur. He probably used gloves.”“How do you know he isn’t an amateur, Sherlock?”“There’s bruising on the left-hand knuckles, and on the sides of both hands. Probably would be on the right-hand knuckles, too, if we had them.”“She hit him,” Howie said. “She fought back.”

“...called nine-one-one," Howie was saying, "and then I heard something in the alleyway, so I went back there and" --Howie coughed-- "and valiantly attacked his knife with my guts, to no avail.""Did you get a good look at him? Could you describe him?"Howie smiled wanly. "Yeah. He was about yay long" --he held up his hands, four inches apart-- "thin, made of steel. Pointy. Sharp.”

“He moved to run a hand through her cornrows, then pulled back remembering the one time he's tried that-Connie had lectured him on the Eleventh Commandment: Thou shalt not touch thy black girlfriend's hair. Ever.”

“It's like this," he'd explained once to Connie. "If someone gave you a single rose, you'd be happy, right?" "Okay," he went on, "Now imagine someone gives you ten thousand roses.""That is a whole lotta roses," she said. "That's too much.""Right. Too much. But more than that, it makes each individual rose much less special, right? It makes it hard to pick one out and say, 'That's the good one.' And it makes you want to just get rid of them all because none of them seem special now."Connie had narrowed her eyes. "Are you saying when you're at school you just want to get rid of everyone?”

“Length isn’t as important as what you say and how you say it.”

“In a way, i feel sorry for boys. They're weak. You show them boobs or a butt and they just fall apart.But I feel sorry for girls, too. Because girls get screwed, even when they're not naked with a guy. Everyone hates girls--even other girls. I mean, "girl" is like an insult, you know? "That's so girly." "Stop being a girl." "You're like a little girl."Hey, you know what? I was a little girl once and I kicked ass. I was awesome.”

“Not according to this," Jazz said, taking the report. "No evidence of sexual activity or anything like it.""Well, there's that," Howie said, sounding relieved. Jazz wondered at that - was it really so much better to be unmolested, but still murdered in a horrible fashion? To die in pain and terror, stripped, left in a field, your fingers cut off? But as long as you weren't raped, well, that was alright, then? Did it really matter at that point?”